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A review by scribepub
Walking in Berlin: a flaneur in the capital by Franz Hessel
Hessel is a feisty, clever, and witty guide to Berlin; his prose is animated and sumptuous and his perceptions glamorously lyrical. For anyone who knows the geography of Berlin, this book is an especial treat.
Gail Jones, Saturday Age
Beautiful … a classic observation of the German city in the late 1920s that illuminates many of the historic shadows and provides a wonderful map for modern-day wanderings.
Sydney Morning Herald
[A]n absolutely epic book, a walking remembrance.
Walter Benjamin
Walking in Berlin is a magical mystery tour of a city on the brink of upheaval. Hessel may have wandered haphazardly but he wrote with purpose, never once losing his way.
Malcolm Forbes, Sunday Herald
Walking in Berlin can be read lightly as a postcard from the past; it should be read seriously as an inexhaustible record of all that Berlin was and might have been, as an enthralling guide to a wealth of references, sidetracks, lost paths … This is a first encounter with the myth and the reality of that intangible fantastic beast of a city.
Mika Provata-Carlone, Bookanista
Captures a portrait of a city on the brink of irrevocable change … Hessel was both detailed chronicler of the present, and a man keenly aware of the city’s history … Apt then that Walking in Berlin now joins this historical hall of fame.
Lucy Scholes, The Independent
Hessel’s conversational style and subtle insights evoke Weimar Berlin and reveal a great deal about the Germany of his days.
Eileen Battersby, The Irish Times
[Walking in Berlin] is not only an important record of old Berlin; it is a testimony to its enduring spirit.
Harry Strawson, TLS
Hessel is a modest master of spontaneous observation.
Sabine Vogel, Berliner Zeitung
…a newly rediscovered treasure.
Die Welt
To this day, there is no better Berlin travel guide.
Peter Von Becker, Tagesspiegel
When you think of Berlin in the 1920s, you cannot avoid thinking of the storyteller, critic and translator Franz Hessel.
Manfred Papst Recommends Spazieren in Berlin in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ)
Like a private invitation back to the city’s most beguiling era … Irreverent and yet always enthusiastic, [Hessel’s] 88-year-old love letter to this city is a true map of the traces of a bygone world.
Vanessa Thorpe, The Observer Magazine
Hessel’s warm enthusiasm for his home town informs every page, and provides the reader with a geographical guide that still holds value, despite the enormous changes in the city. More than that, though, it evokes a time that, although just about within living memory, seems almost as remote as the nineteenth-century Berlin of Schinkel.
Shiny New Books
[A] sprawling panorama of cultural memory and miscellany, a vibrant catalog of metropolitan life, and a seismograph of a city on the verge of disaster.
Los Angeles Review of Books
Hessel’s wonderings in the Weimar-era German capital mix social commentary with artistic and architectural analysis … his musings offer a fresh set of eyes.
GQ
A timely ode to a good meander and [Hessel’s] home city [Berlin].
Wanderlust
Gail Jones, Saturday Age
Beautiful … a classic observation of the German city in the late 1920s that illuminates many of the historic shadows and provides a wonderful map for modern-day wanderings.
Sydney Morning Herald
[A]n absolutely epic book, a walking remembrance.
Walter Benjamin
Walking in Berlin is a magical mystery tour of a city on the brink of upheaval. Hessel may have wandered haphazardly but he wrote with purpose, never once losing his way.
Malcolm Forbes, Sunday Herald
Walking in Berlin can be read lightly as a postcard from the past; it should be read seriously as an inexhaustible record of all that Berlin was and might have been, as an enthralling guide to a wealth of references, sidetracks, lost paths … This is a first encounter with the myth and the reality of that intangible fantastic beast of a city.
Mika Provata-Carlone, Bookanista
Captures a portrait of a city on the brink of irrevocable change … Hessel was both detailed chronicler of the present, and a man keenly aware of the city’s history … Apt then that Walking in Berlin now joins this historical hall of fame.
Lucy Scholes, The Independent
Hessel’s conversational style and subtle insights evoke Weimar Berlin and reveal a great deal about the Germany of his days.
Eileen Battersby, The Irish Times
[Walking in Berlin] is not only an important record of old Berlin; it is a testimony to its enduring spirit.
Harry Strawson, TLS
Hessel is a modest master of spontaneous observation.
Sabine Vogel, Berliner Zeitung
…a newly rediscovered treasure.
Die Welt
To this day, there is no better Berlin travel guide.
Peter Von Becker, Tagesspiegel
When you think of Berlin in the 1920s, you cannot avoid thinking of the storyteller, critic and translator Franz Hessel.
Manfred Papst Recommends Spazieren in Berlin in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ)
Like a private invitation back to the city’s most beguiling era … Irreverent and yet always enthusiastic, [Hessel’s] 88-year-old love letter to this city is a true map of the traces of a bygone world.
Vanessa Thorpe, The Observer Magazine
Hessel’s warm enthusiasm for his home town informs every page, and provides the reader with a geographical guide that still holds value, despite the enormous changes in the city. More than that, though, it evokes a time that, although just about within living memory, seems almost as remote as the nineteenth-century Berlin of Schinkel.
Shiny New Books
[A] sprawling panorama of cultural memory and miscellany, a vibrant catalog of metropolitan life, and a seismograph of a city on the verge of disaster.
Los Angeles Review of Books
Hessel’s wonderings in the Weimar-era German capital mix social commentary with artistic and architectural analysis … his musings offer a fresh set of eyes.
GQ
A timely ode to a good meander and [Hessel’s] home city [Berlin].
Wanderlust